Credit CARD Act of 2009
The Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009 is a federal statute passed by the United States Congress and signed by U. S. President Barack Obama on May 22, 2009, it is comprehensive credit card reform legislation that aims "...to establish fair and transparent practices relating to the extension of credit under an open end consumer credit plan, for other purposes." The bill was passed with bipartisan support by both the House of the Senate. The Credit Cardholders' Bill of Rights was introduced in the 110th Congress as H. R. 5244 in the House of Representatives by Representative Carolyn Maloney, a Democrat from New York and the chair of the House Financial Services Committee's Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit. The bill was never given a vote in the Senate. In the 111th United States Congress, the bill was reintroduced as H. R. 627 and on April 30, 2009, the House passed 357 yes votes to 70 no votes. The Senate passed an amended version on May 19 with 90 yes votes and 5 no votes.
The House passed the amended bill the next day by a vote of 279 to 147 and it was signed into law by President Barack Obama on May 22, 2009. The bill went into effect on February 2010, nine months after it was enacted; the Credit Cardholders' Bill of Rights includes several provisions aimed at limiting how credit card companies can charge consumers but does not include price controls, rate caps, or fee settings. Key provisions include: Giving consumers enough time to pay their bills. Credit card companies have to give consumers at least 21 days to pay from the time the bill is mailed. Credit card companies can not "trap" consumers by setting payment deadlines on the weekend or in the middle of the day, or changing their payment deadlines each month. Creditors may not charge late fees if debtor shows proof of payment by close of business on the due date. If the established due date falls upon a Saturday, Sunday, or legal banking holiday, the due date is pushed back to the next business day. No retroactive rate increases.
Credit card companies must give consumers at least 45 days notice if their rates are about to go up, can not change any terms of the contract within a year. Low introductory rates must last at least six months. Easier to pay down debt. Credit card companies must apply payment amounts "in excess of the minimum payment amount" to a consumer's highest interest rate balances first. Statements must show consumers how long it would take to pay off their existing balance if the consumer made only the minimum payment, must show the payment amount and total interest cost to pay off the entire balance in 36 months. Eliminates "fee harvester cards." The act restricts fees on low-balance cards sold to cardholders with bad credit. For many of these cards, the up-front fees charged exceeded the remaining credit; the act restricts the fees that can be charged for gift cards and other prepaid cards. Eliminates excessive marketing to young people. Consumers under the age of 21 must prove that they have an independent income or get a co-signer before applying for a credit card.
The Act prevents credit card companies from mailing offers to consumers under 21 unless they "opt in," and prohibits companies from wooing students with T-shirts, free pizza and other free gifts at university-sponsored events. Gun rights advocates in the Senate, led by Tom Coburn added an unrelated rider to the bill to prevent the Secretary of the Interior from enforcing any regulation that would prohibit an individual from possessing a firearm in any unit of the National Park System or the National Wildlife Refuge System; the Senate passed the amendment 67-29. This amendment overturns a Reagan-era policy prohibiting firearms from being carried in national parks; the George W. Bush administration had attempted to implement a similar policy through the rulemaking process just before leaving office, but the change was struck down by a federal judge; the provision has been criticized by some environmentalists and gun control advocates, but it was applauded by gun rights groups. The act was not expected to affect existing credit card contracts.
However, the act, passed applies to contracts made in the past by setting an effective date of February 22, 2010, which gave banks time to prepare and notify their customers. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in its October 2013 report on the CARD Act found that between the first quarter of 2009 and December 2013, credit card interest rates increased on average from 16.2% to 18.5%, while the “total cost of credit,” that is, the total of all fees and interest paid by all consumers as a percentage of the average cycle-ending balance, decreased by two hundred basis points. The CFPB made no judgment on the extent to which the CARD Act contributed to these increases and decreases. However, interest rates on other types of consumer credit increased; the CFPB in its study found that consumers paid less in late payment and over-the-limit fees since passage of the CARD Act. In contrast, studies by CardHub.com and the Center for Responsible Lending argued that interest rate trends were the result of economic pressures typical of a recession and not the law.
According to these studies, historical economic data shows that the interest rate increase and decline in available credit seen during the Great Recession should have been worse considering the widespread unemployment, credit card delinquency and credit card charge-offs. Section 502 of the CARD Act requires a review of the consumer credit card market to be undertaken every two years. In February 2013 letter to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as part of the review, the American Bankers Association wrote that "the CARD Act has provided clear and signi
Federal Reserve Act
The Federal Reserve Act was passed by the 63rd United States Congress and signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson on December 23, 1913. The law created the central banking system of the United States; the Panic of 1907 convinced many Americans of the need to establish a central banking system, which the country had lacked since the Bank War of the 1830s. After Democrats won unified control of Congress and the presidency in the 1912 elections, President Wilson, Congressman Carter Glass, Senator Robert Latham Owen crafted a central banking bill that occupied a middle ground between the Aldrich Plan, which called for private control of the central banking system, progressives like William Jennings Bryan, who favored government control over the central banking system. Wilson made the bill one of top priorities of his New Freedom domestic agenda, he helped ensure that it passed both houses of Congress without major amendments; the Federal Reserve Act created the Federal Reserve System, consisting of twelve regional Federal Reserve Banks jointly responsible for managing the country's money supply, making loans and providing oversight to banks, serving as a lender of last resort.
To lead the Federal Reserve System, the act established the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, members of which are appointed by the president. The 1933 Banking Act amended the Federal Reserve Act to create the Federal Open Market Committee, which oversees the Federal Reserve's open market operations. A amendment requires the Federal Reserve "to promote the goals of maximum employment, stable prices, moderate long-term interest rates." The Federal Reserve Act created a system of public entities. There were to no more than twelve private regional Federal Reserve banks. Twelve were established, each had various branches, a board of directors, district boundaries; the Federal Reserve Board, consisting of seven members, was created as the governing body of the Fed. Each member is appointed by the President of the U. S and confirmed by the U. S. Senate. In 1935, the Board was restructured. Created as part of the Federal Reserve System was a 12-member Federal Advisory Committee and a single new United States currency, the Federal Reserve Note.
The Federal Reserve Act created a national currency and a monetary system that could respond to the stresses in the banking system and create a stable financial system. With the goal of creating a national monetary system and financial stability, the Federal Reserve Act provided many other functions and financial services for the economy, such as check clearing and collection for all members of the Federal Reserve. With the passing of the Federal Reserve Act, Congress required that all nationally chartered banks become members of the Federal Reserve System; these banks were required to purchase specified non-transferable stock in their regional Federal Reserve banks, to set aside a stipulated amount of non-interest bearing reserves with their respective reserve banks. Since 1980, all depository institutions have been required to set aside reserves with the Federal Reserve; such institutions are entitled to certain Federal Reserve services. State chartered banks were given the option of becoming members of the Federal Reserve System and in the case of the exercise of such option were to be subject to supervision, in part, by the Federal Reserve System.
Member banks became entitled to have access to discounted loans at the discount window in their respective reserve banks, to a 6% annual dividend in their Federal Reserve stock, to other services. Central banking has made various institutional appearances throughout the history of the United States; these institutions started with the First and Second banks of the United States, which were championed in large part by Alexander Hamilton. The American financial system was fragmented after the American Revolutionary War; the government was burdened with large wartime debts, the new republic needed a strong financial institution to give the country a resilient financial footing. Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson had opposing views regarding whether or not the US could benefit from a European-style national financial institution. Hamilton was in favor of building a strong centralized political and economic institution to solve the country’s financial problem, he argued that a central bank could bring order to the US monetary system, manage the government’s revenues and payments, provide credit to both the public and private sectors.
On the other hand, Jefferson was suspicious of a central bank because, he argued, it would undermine democracy. Jefferson and Southern members of congress believed that a strong central financial institution would serve commercial interests of the north at the expense of Southern-based agriculture interests whose credit was provided by local banks during the post-revolutionary war era; the First Bank of the United States was established in 1791 chartered for a period of twenty years. The US government was the largest shareholder of the bank. Despite its shareholder status, the government was not permitted to participate in management of the bank; the bank accepted deposits, issued bank notes, provided short-term loans to the government. It functioned as a clearinghouse for government debt; the bank could regulate state-chartered banks to prevent overproduction of banknotes. The bank was successful in financing the government and stimulating the economy. In spite of its successes, hostility against the bank did not fade.
Jeffersonians questioned the bank’s constitutionality. In 1811, the first bank of the United States failed to be renewed by one vote in both the House and the Senate. After the War of 1812, econo
64th United States Congress
The Sixty-fourth United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, DC from March 4, 1915, to March 4, 1917, during the third and fourth years of Woodrow Wilson's presidency; the apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives was based on the Thirteenth Census of the United States in 1910. Both chambers had a Democratic majority. June 9, 1915::U. S. Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan resigned over a disagreement regarding the nation's handling of the RMS Lusitania sinking. July 24, 1915: The steamer SS Eastland capsized in central Chicago, with the loss of 844 lives. July 28, 1915: The United States occupation of Haiti began. August 5–August 23, 1915: Hurricane Two of the 1915 Atlantic hurricane season over Galveston and New Orleans left 275 dead. March 8–March 9, 1916: Mexican Revolution: Pancho Villa led about 500 Mexican raiders in an attack against Columbus, New Mexico, killing 12 U.
S. soldiers. A garrison of the U. S. 13th Cavalry Regiment drives them away. March 15, 1916: President Woodrow Wilson sent 12,000 United States troops over the U. S.-Mexico border to pursue Pancho Villa. May 5, 1916: United States Marines invaded the Dominican Republic. July 30, 1916: German agents caused the Black Tom explosion in Jersey City, New Jersey, an act of sabotage destroying an ammunition depot and killing at least 7 people. November 7, 1916: U. S. presidential election, 1916: Democratic President Woodrow Wilson narrowly defeated Republican Charles E. Hughes. January 11, 1917:: German saboteurs set off the Kingsland Explosion at Kingsland, NJ, one of the events leading to U. S. involvement in World War I. February 3, 1917::The United States severs diplomatic relations with Germany May 15, 1916: Kern Amendment May 29, 1916: Fraudulent Advertising Act of 1916 May 31, 1916: Tillman Act June 3, 1916: National Defense Act of 1916 June 9, 1916: Chamberlain–Ferris Act July 11, 1916: Federal Aid Road Act of 1916 July 11, 1916: Terminal Inspection Act of 1916 July 17, 1916: Federal Farm Loan Act July 27, 1916: River and Harbors Act of 1916 July 28, 1916: Space Basis Act July 28, 1916: Railway Mail Service Pay Act August 9, 1916: Uniform Bill of Lading Act of 1916 August 11, 1916: Irrigation District Act of 1916 August 11, 1916: Wildlife Game Refuges Act of 1916 August 11, 1916: Grain Standards Act of 1916 August 11, 1916: Cotton Futures Act of 1916 August 11, 1916: Brush Disposal Act of 1916 August 11, 1916: Warehouse Act of 1916 August 25, 1916: National Park Service Act August 29, 1916: 2nd Uniform Bill of Lading Act of 1916 August 29, 1916: Jones Act August 29, 1916: Federal Possession and Control Act of 1916 August 29, 1916: Army Appropriations Act of 1916 August 29, 1916: Naval Act of 1916 August 29, 1916: Naval Reserve Force Act August 31, 1916: Federal Standard Container Act August 31, 1916: Standard Fruits and Vegetable Baskets and Containers Act of 1916 September 1, 1916: Keating–Owen Act September 3, 1916: Adamson Act September 7, 1916: Merchant Marine Act of 1916 September 7, 1916: Workingmen's Compensation Act September 8, 1916: Anti-Dumping Act of 1916 September 8, 1916: Emergency Revenue Act of 1916 October 20, 1916: Special Air Preparedness Act December 29, 1916: Stock-Raising Homestead Act February 5, 1917: Immigration Act of 1917 February 22, 1917: Federal Interpleader Act of 1917 February 23, 1917: Smith–Hughes Act February 26, 1917: Mount McKinley National Park Act of 1917 March 1, 1917: Flood Control Act of 1917 March 2, 1917: Jones–Shafroth Act March 3, 1917: Reed Amendment March 3, 1917: Sheppard Bone-Dry Act March 3, 1917: Special Preparedness Fund Act of 1917 March 4, 1917: Timber Export Act January 17, 1917: Treaty of the Danish West Indies signed by President Wilson, ceding the Danish West Indies to the United States after their purchase from Denmark, renaming them the US Virgin Islands.
Democratic: 230 Republican: 196 Progressive: 6 Prohibition: 1 Socialist: 1 Independent: 1TOTAL members: 435 President: Thomas R. Marshall Presidents pro tempore: James P. Clarke and Willard Saulsbury, Jr. Majority Whip: J. Hamilton Lewis Minority Whip: Charles Curtis Republican Conference Chairman: Jacob Harold Gallinger Democratic Caucus Chair: John W. Kern Republican Conference Secretary: James Wolcott Wadsworth Jr. Democratic Caucus Secretary: Willard Saulsbury Jr. until December 14, 1916 Key Pittman, acting Speaker: Champ Clark Majority Leader: Claude Kitchin Majority Whip: vacant Democratic Caucus Chairman: Edward W. Saunders Democratic Campaign Committee Chairman: Frank Ellsworth Doremus Minority Leader: James R. Mann Minority Whip: Charles M. Hamilton Republican Conference Chair: William S. Greene Skip to House of Representatives, below At this time, most sitting Senators had been elected by the state legislatures, with one-third beginning new six-year terms with each Congress. Due to the 17th Amendment, the incoming class of senators from the 1914 election were all elected directly by the residents of their state, In this Congress, Class 1 meant their term ended with this Congress, requiring reelection in 1916.
The names of members of the House of Representatives are preceded by their district numbers. The count below reflects changes from the beginning of the first session of this Congress. Replacem
Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008
The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, sometimes referred to as the "bank bailout of 2008," was proposed by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, passed by the 110th United States Congress, signed into law by President George W. Bush; the act became law as part of Public Law 110-343 on October 3, 2008, in the midst of the financial crisis of 2007–2008. The law created the Troubled Asset Relief Program to purchase distressed assets from financial institutions. A financial crisis had developed throughout 2007 and 2008 due to a subprime mortgage crisis, causing the failure or near-failure of major financial institutions like Lehman Brothers and American International Group. Seeking to prevent the collapse of the financial system, Secretary of the Treasury Paulson called for the U. S. government to purchase about several hundred billion dollars in distressed assets from financial institutions. Paulson's proposal was rejected by Congress, but the ongoing financial crisis and the lobbying of President Bush convinced Congress to enact Paulson's proposal as part of Public Law 110-343.
The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 created the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program to purchase toxic assets from banks. The funds for purchase of distressed assets were redirected to inject capital into banks and other financial institutions while the Treasury continued to examine the usefulness of targeted asset purchases; the legislation had its origin in early 2008, Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson directed two of his aides, Neel Kashkari and Phillip Swagel, to write a plan to recapitalize the U. S. financial system in case of total collapse. The plan, presented to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, called for the U. S. government to purchase about $500 billion in distressed assets from financial institutions. The original proposal was submitted to the United States House of Representatives, with the purpose of purchasing bad assets, reducing uncertainty regarding the worth of the remaining assets, restoring confidence in the credit markets; the bill was expanded and put forth as an amendment to H.
R. 3997. The amendment was rejected via a vote of the House of Representatives on September 29, 2008, voting 205–228. Supporters of the plan argued that the market intervention called for by the plan was vital to prevent further erosion of confidence in the U. S. credit markets and that failure to act could lead to an economic depression. Opponents objected to the plan's cost and rapidity, pointing to polls that showed little support among the public for "bailing out" Wall Street investment banks, claimed that better alternatives were not considered, that the Senate forced passage of the unpopular version through the opposing house by "sweetening" the bailout package. On October 1, 2008, the Senate debated and voted on an amendment to H. R. 1424, which substituted a newly revised version of the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 for the language of H. R. 1424. The Senate accepted the amendment and passed the entire amended bill, voting 74–25. Additional unrelated provisions added an estimated $150 billion to the cost of the package and increased the length of the bill to 451 pages.
The amended version of H. R. 1424 was sent to the House for consideration, on October 3, the House voted 263–171 to enact the bill into law. President George W. Bush signed the bill into law within hours of its congressional enactment, creating the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program to purchase failing bank assets. On October 8, the British announced their bank rescue package consisting of funding, debt guarantees and infusing capital into banks via preferred stock; this model was followed by the rest of Europe, as well as the U. S Government, who on the October 14 announced a $250bn Capital Purchase Program to buy stakes in a wide variety of banks in an effort to restore confidence in the sector; the money came from the $700bn Troubled Asset Relief Program. Over the next six months, TARP was dwarfed by lending limits. S. that year. After the freeing up of world capital markets in the 1970s and the repeal of the Glass–Steagall Act in 1999, the banking practices along with monetized subprime mortgages sold as no risk investments, reached a critical stage during September 2008, characterized by contracted liquidity in the global credit markets and insolvency threats to investment banks and other institutions.
In response, the U. S. government announced a series of comprehensive steps to address the problems, following a series of "one-off" or "case-by-case" decisions to intervene or not, such as the $85 billion liquidity facility for American International Group on September 16, the federal takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers. On Monday, October 6, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped more than 700 points and fell below 10,000 for the first time in four years; the same day, CNN reported these worldwide stock market events: Britain's FTSE 100 Index was down 7.9% Germany's DAX down 7.1% France's CAC 40 dropping 9% In Russia, trading in shares was suspended after the RTS stock index fell more than 20%. Iceland halted trading in six bank stocks. U. S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson proposed a plan under which the U. S. Treasury would acquire up to $700 billion worth of mortgage-backed securities; the plan was backed by President George W. Bush and negotiations began with leaders in the U.
S. Congre
William Howard Taft
William Howard Taft was the 27th president of the United States and the tenth chief justice of the United States, the only person to have held both offices. Taft was elected president in 1908, the chosen successor of Theodore Roosevelt, but was defeated for re-election by Woodrow Wilson in 1912 after Roosevelt split the Republican vote by running as a third-party candidate. In 1921, President Warren G. Harding appointed Taft to be chief justice, a position in which he served until a month before his death. Taft was born in Cincinnati in 1857, his father, Alphonso Taft, was a U. S. Attorney General and Secretary of War. Taft attended Yale and, like his father, was a member of Bones. After becoming a lawyer, he was appointed a judge while still in his twenties, he continued a rapid rise, being named Solicitor General and as a judge of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. In 1901, President William McKinley appointed Taft civilian governor of the Philippines. In 1904, Roosevelt made him Secretary of War, he became Roosevelt's hand-picked successor.
Despite his personal ambition to become chief justice, Taft declined repeated offers of appointment to the Supreme Court of the United States, believing his political work to be more important. With Roosevelt's help, Taft had little opposition for the Republican nomination for president in 1908 and defeated William Jennings Bryan for the presidency that November. In the White House, he focused on East Asia more than European affairs and intervened to prop up or remove Latin American governments. Taft sought reductions to trade tariffs a major source of governmental income, but the resulting bill was influenced by special interests, his administration was filled with conflict between the conservative wing of the Republican Party, with which Taft sympathized, the progressive wing, toward which Roosevelt moved more and more. Controversies over conservation and antitrust cases filed by the Taft administration served to further separate the two men. Roosevelt challenged Taft for renomination in 1912.
Taft used his control of the party machinery to gain a bare majority of delegates and Roosevelt bolted the party. The split left Taft with little chance of re-election and he took only Utah and Vermont in Wilson's victory. After leaving office, Taft returned to Yale as a professor, continuing his political activity and working against war through the League to Enforce Peace. In 1921, President Harding appointed Taft as an office he had long sought. Chief Justice Taft was a conservative on business issues and under him there were advances in individual rights. In poor health, he resigned in February 1930. After his death the next month, he was buried at Arlington National Cemetery, the first president and first Supreme Court justice to be interred there. Taft is listed near the middle in historians' rankings of U. S. presidents. William Howard Taft was born September 15, 1857 in Cincinnati, Ohio, to Alphonso Taft and Louise Torrey; the Taft family was not wealthy. Alphonso served as a judge, ambassador and in the cabinet, as War Secretary and Attorney General under Ulysses S. Grant.
William Taft was a hard worker. He attended Woodward High School in Cincinnati. At Yale College, which he entered in 1874, the heavyset, jovial Taft was popular, was an intramural heavyweight wrestling champion. One classmate described him succeeding through hard work rather than being the smartest, as having integrity. In 1878, Taft graduated, second in his class out of 121, he attended Cincinnati Law School, graduated with a Bachelor of Laws in 1880. While in law school, he worked on The Cincinnati Commercial newspaper, edited by Murat Halstead. Taft was assigned to cover the local courts, spent time reading law in his father's office. Shortly before graduating from law school, Taft went to the state capital of Columbus to take the bar examination and passed. After admission to the Ohio bar, Taft devoted himself to his job at the Commercial full-time. Halstead was willing to take him on permanently at an increased salary if he would give up the law, but Taft declined. In October 1880, Taft was appointed assistant prosecutor for Hamilton County, took office the following January.
Taft served for a year as assistant prosecutor. He resigned in January 1882 after President Chester A. Arthur appointed him Collector of Internal Revenue for Ohio's First District, an area centered on Cincinnati. Taft refused to dismiss competent employees who were politically out of favor, resigned effective in March 1883, writing to Arthur that he wished to begin private practice in Cincinnati. In 1884, Taft campaigned for the Republican candidate for president, Maine Senator James G. Blaine, who lost to New York Governor Grover Cleveland. In 1887, Taft aged 29, was appointed to a vacancy on the Superior Court of Cincinnati by Governor Joseph B. Foraker; the appointment was good for just over a year, after which he would have to face the voters, in April 1888, he sought election for the first of three times in his lifetime, the other two being for the presidency. He was elected to a full five-year term; some two dozen of Taft's opinions as a state judge survive, the most significant being Moores & Co. v. Bricklayers' Union No. 1 if only because it was used against him when he ran for president in 1908.
The case involved bricklayers who refused to work for any firm that de
Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act
The Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act is a United States federal law, enacted on July 21, 2010. The law overhauled financial regulation in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2007–2008, it made changes affecting all federal financial regulatory agencies and every part of the nation's financial services industry. Responding to widespread calls for changes to the financial regulatory system, in June 2009 President Barack Obama introduced a proposal for a "sweeping overhaul of the United States financial regulatory system, a transformation on a scale not seen since the reforms that followed the Great Depression". Legislation based on his proposal was introduced in the United States House of Representatives by Congressman Barney Frank, in the United States Senate by Senator Chris Dodd. Most congressional support for Dodd-Frank came from members of the Democratic Party, but three Senate Republicans voted for the bill, allowing it to overcome the Senate filibuster. Dodd-Frank reorganized the financial regulatory system, eliminating the Office of Thrift Supervision, assigning new responsibilities to existing agencies like the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, creating new agencies like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
The CFPB was charged with protecting consumers against abuses related to credit cards and other financial products. The act created the Financial Stability Oversight Council and the Office of Financial Research to identify threats to the financial stability of the United States, gave the Federal Reserve new powers to regulate systemically important institutions. To handle the liquidation of large companies, the act created the Orderly Liquidation Authority. One provision, the Volcker Rule, restricts banks from making certain kinds of speculative investments; the act repealed the exemption from regulation for security-based swaps, requiring credit-default swaps and other transactions to be cleared through either exchanges or clearinghouses. Other provisions affect issues such as corporate governance, 1256 Contracts, credit rating agencies. Dodd-Frank is regarded as one of the most significant laws enacted during the presidency of Barack Obama. Studies have found the Dodd–Frank Act has improved financial stability and consumer protection, although there has been debate regarding its economic effects.
In 2017, Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen stated that "the balance of research suggests that the core reforms we have put in place have boosted resilience without unduly limiting credit availability or economic growth." Some critics have argued that the law had a negative impact on economic growth and small banks, or failed to provide adequate regulation to the financial industry. Many Republicans have called for the total repeal of the law; the financial crisis of 2007–10 led to widespread calls for changes in the regulatory system. In June 2009, President Obama introduced a proposal for a "sweeping overhaul of the United States financial regulatory system, a transformation on a scale not seen since the reforms that followed the Great Depression"; as the finalized bill emerged from conference, President Obama said that it included 90 percent of the reforms he had proposed. Major components of Obama's original proposal, listed by the order in which they appear in the "A New Foundation" outline, include The consolidation of regulatory agencies, elimination of the national thrift charter, new oversight council to evaluate systemic risk Comprehensive regulation of financial markets, including increased transparency of derivatives Consumer protection reforms including a new consumer protection agency and uniform standards for "plain vanilla" products as well as strengthened investor protection Tools for financial crisis, including a "resolution regime" complementing the existing Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation authority to allow for orderly winding down of bankrupt firms, including a proposal that the Federal Reserve receive authorization from the Treasury for extensions of credit in "unusual or exigent circumstances" Various measures aimed at increasing international standards and cooperation including proposals related to improved accounting and tightened regulation of credit rating agenciesAt President Obama's request, Congress added the Volcker Rule to this proposal in January 2010.
The bills that came after Obama's proposal were consistent with the proposal, but contained some additional provisions and differences in implementation. The Volcker Rule was not included in Obama's initial June 2009 proposal, but Obama proposed the rule in January 2010, after the House bill had passed; the rule, which prohibits depository banks from proprietary trading, was passed only in the Senate bill, the conference committee enacted the rule in a weakened form, Section 619 of the bill, that allowed banks to invest up to 3 percent of their tier 1 capital in private equity and hedge funds as well as trade for hedging purposes. On December 2, 2009, revised versions of the bill were introduced in the House of Representatives by then–financial services committee chairman Barney Frank, in the Senate Banking Committee by former chairman Chris Dodd; the initial version of the bill passed the House along party lines in December by a vote of 223 to 202, passed the Senate with amendments in May 2010 with a vote of 59 to 39 again along party lines.
The bill moved to conference committee, where the Senate bill was used as the base text although a few House provisions were included in the bill's base text. The final bill p
National Bank Act
The National Banking Acts of 1863 and 1864 were two United States federal banking acts that established a system of national banks, created the United States National Banking System. They encouraged development of a national currency backed by bank holdings of U. S. Treasury securities and established the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency as part of the United States Department of the Treasury and a system of nationally chartered banks; the Act shaped today's national banking system and its support of a uniform U. S. banking policy. At the beginning Second Bank of the United States in 1836, the control of banking regimes devolved to the states. Different states adopted policies including a total ban on banking, a single state-chartered bank, limited chartering of banks, free entry. While the relative success of New York's "free banking" laws led a number of states to adopt a free-entry banking regime, the system remained poorly integrated across state lines. Though all banknotes were uniformly denominated in dollars, notes would circulate at a steep discount in states beyond their issue.
In the end, there were well-publicized frauds arising in states like Michigan, which had adopted free entry regimes but did not require redeemability of bank issues for specie. The perception of dangerous "wildcat" banking, along with the poor integration of the U. S. banking system, led to increasing public support for a uniform national banking regime. The United States Government, on the other hand, still had limited taxation capabilities, so had an interest in the seigniorage potential of a national bank. In 1846, the Polk Administration created a United States Treasury system that moved public funds from private banks to Treasury branches in order to fund the Mexican–American War. However, without a national currency, the revenue generated. One of the first attempts to issue a national currency came in the early days of the Civil War when Congress approved the Legal Tender Act of 1862, allowing the issue of $150 million in national notes known as greenbacks and mandating that paper money be issued and accepted in lieu of gold and silver coins.
The bills were backed only by the national government's promise to redeem them and their value was dependent on public confidence in the government as well as the ability of the government to give out specie in exchange for the bills in the future. Many thought this promise backing the bills was about as good as the green ink printed on one side, hence the name "greenbacks."The Second Legal Tender Act, enacted July 11, 1862, a Joint Resolution of Congress, the Third Legal Tender Act, enacted March 3, 1863, expanded the limit to $450 million. The largest amount of greenbacks outstanding at any one time was calculated as $447,300,203.10. The National Bank Act known as the National Currency Act, was passed in the Senate by a 23–21 vote; the main goal of this act was to create a single national currency and to eradicate the problem of notes from multiple banks circulating simultaneously. The Act established national banks that could issue notes which were backed by the United States Treasury and printed by the government itself.
The quantity of notes that a bank was allowed to issue was proportional to the bank's level of capital deposited with the Comptroller of the Currency at the Treasury. To further control the currency, the Act taxed notes issued by state and local banks pushing non-federally issued paper out of circulation; the National Banking Act of 1863 was superseded by the National Banking Act of 1864 just one year later. The new act established federally-issued bank charters, which took banking out of the hands of state governments. Before the act, charters were granted by state legislatures, they could be influenced by bribes. This problem was resolved to some degree by free banking laws in some states, but it was not until this act was passed that free banking was established on a uniform, national level and charter issuance was taken out of the hands of discriminating and corrupt state legislatures; the first bank to receive a national charter was the First National Bank of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The first new national bank to open was The First National Bank of Iowa.
Additionally, the new Act converted more than 1,500 state banks to national banks. The National Bank Act of 1863 was passed on February 25th, 1863, was the first attempt to establish a central bank after the failures of the First and Second Banks of the United States, served as the predecessor to the Federal Reserve Act of 1913; the act allowed the creation of national banks, set out a plan for establishing a national currency backed by government securities held by other banks, gave the federal government the ability to sell war bonds and securities. National banks were chartered by the federal government, were subject to stricter regulation. A high tax on state banks was levied to discourage competition, by 1865 most state banks had either received national charters or collapsed; the 1864 act, based on a New York State law, brought the federal government into active supervision of commercial banks. It established the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency with the responsibility of chartering and supervising all national banks.
On July 13, 1866, the banking Act of 1865 was extended beyond requiring every national banking association, state bank, or state banking association to pay a 10% tax on any note
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